Echo 1 is FREE for five days, and Echo 2 & 3 are $0.99 for seven days! Tell your family and friends! 😀 (I’ll be publishing a variant of this message morning and afternoon until 11/16 when the sale ends, so I apologize if it gets a little repetitive).
Get Echo Vol. 1 on Kindle here: Vol. 1 on Kindle. Vol. 2 on Kindle here: Vol.2 on Kindle Vol. 3 on Kindle here: Vol. 3 on Kindle #kindle #kindleunlimited #sciencefiction #scifi #books #novel #book
Hi, Everybody,
I have been writing historical novels under the name of Emily Littler. I currently have one pubished, called Vengeance of a Slave. I started a website in order to promote it and get it known that it exists. However, I’m finding it well nigh impossible to keep up with both this site and that one so I’ve decided to add a page here dedicated to Emily’s novels.
This is a guest post by Adela Belin, a private educator and a writer at Writers Per Hour. She shares her teaching experience with colleagues, students, and writers. Feel free to contact her on G+.
I strongly believe that one of the things making the Expanse or Firefly such great series is the language: Chinese curses for the latter, the Belter lingo for the former. It’s these small things that make or break a story, and that’s why you gotta love linguistics!
Anyone who has tried to take a look at language and history knows that words are inherently arbitrary, merely symbolic, and are agreed upon by common demographic consensus. Language does not only change its shape and form according to the geography but also through the course of time; history. A word that holds any meaning today may…
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I love this. Just what annoys me about Facebook. Do I care you’ve just been to the gym, or daten the most amazing curry ever?
Before you post something, ask if you would tell someone in the street. Please.
I was going though my mobile gallery found an image, I don’t know who actually wrote it, but wanted to share it with you guys because it is hilarious AF. 😛
I am trying to make friends outside of Facebook while applying the same principles.
Therefore, every day I walk down the street and tell passers-by what I have eaten, How I feel at the moment, what I have done the night before, what I will do later and with whom.
I give them pictures of my family, my dog and of me gardening, taking things apart in the garage, watering the lawn, standing in front of landmarks, driving around town, having lunch and doing what anybody and everybody does every day.
I also listen to their conversations, give them the “thumbs up” and tell them I like them.
And it works just like Facebook! I already have four…
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Samhain is the pagan pre-curser to what we now call Hallowe’en. It was thought that on the nights of the equinox the veil separating the world of the dead from our own world thinned, and the dead could come through.
Not all the dead were consindered scary, though. The people thought that their recent dead visited them, and they put out food, or set an extra place at the table to accommodate them. These dead came to see their loved ones were going on alright.
Evil spirits, though, could come through, too, and so bonfires were lit to keep them at bay. The home fires were put out, too, to be relit the following day from the bonfires.
Pope Gregory decided that some of the pagan dates should be incorporated into the Christian calendar as psople were used to celebrating on those days. Samhain was one of these. The Pope designated it to be All Saint’s Day, hence the night before became All Hallow’s Eve. (Hallows being another word for ‘holy’ or ‘saint’.)
Pope Gregory also fixed the date of Christmas to co-incide with the pagan festival of Yule, and turned some of the pagan gods into saints. He also used pagan worshiping sites to build Christian churches, on the same principal. People were used to going there to worship.
Here is a poem I wrote for Samhain. I hope you like it.
SAMHAIN
Don’t go near the graveyard, darling,
Samain is tonight.
Don’t go near the graveyard, darling,
The dead will walk this night.
Keep your candle burning, darling,
Keep it glowing bright.
Keep your candle burning, darling,
Be sure it gives you light.
The bonfires have been lit, darling,
To fill the dark with light.
The bonfires have been lit, darling,
Their flames reach such a height.
Put your home fires out, darling.
Be sure to do it right.
Put your home fires out, darling.
From bonfires we’ll relight.
Put food by the door, darling.
Leave it in plain sight.
Put food by the door, darling.
For our own to have a bite.
Do not be afraid, darling,
They see that we’re alright.
Do not be afraid, darling,
No harm from them tonight.
But evil spirits come, darling.
We must put them to flight.
But evil spirits come, darling;
Them we must try to fight.
Go and watch the bonfires, darling.
Stand in their bright light.
Go and watch the bonfires, darling,
They keep us safe this night.
I hope you enjoyed my poem. Please leave a comment.
There are two words that most people get wrong, these days. Strangely, they do not have similar spelling, nor similar sounds. When they are used wrongly, it grates on me.
Many well-educated people do not seem to be able to get it right, either.
What are these words?
They are Number and Amount.
The word ‘Number’ is rarely misused but ‘Amount’ is. All the time.
Let me try to explain the difference.
NUMBER This refers to, not surprisingly, the number of things.
It is used when we count things. 1,2,3,4,5 etc.
We can also say, for those techies amongst us, it is a digital word.
It tells us how many of something there is.
AMOUNT This refers to a measurement.
It is used when we don’t actually count individual things.
It is an analogue word.
It tells us how much of something there is.
Thus, to say ‘The amount of people at the party was 30′ is wrong. We are counting those people, not measuring them.
However, it is correct to say ‘The amount of rain that fell in October was less than normal.’ We are measuring the rainfall.
I don’t thing I’ve ever heard number used for a measurement, unless it is something like ‘The number of inches of fabric you need is…’, but then it’s counting, not measuring.
I would like this to get to as many people as possible, as I am getting increasingly stressed by this incorrect usage. Please re-blog it for my sanity’s sake.
A lovely day, the sun was warm
It had shone on us since dawn.
The heat oppressed us all the day,
Even as in bed we lay.
We went to Leipzig in the heat.
In Thomaskirke we took our seat
To hear St John by J.S.Bach.
It did not end till after dark.
When we emerged it was in rain.
We rushed to find our car again.
The thunder rolled across the sky,
The lightning flashed, but now we’re dry.
We drove towards Chemnitz and saw
O’er Dresden, flashes like the War’
Was it ’45 again
With bombs falling like the rain?
The lightning flashed, the thunder boomed.
We thought that wewere surely doomed’
It must at least be Armageddon,
Such brightness in a sky so leaden.
The storm went of for several hours
Showing nature’s awesome powers
And even though it scared us some
We were impressed. It struck us dumb.
If you liked my poem, which was written after an actual storm in Germany, please add a comment and I’ll get back to you. If you woul like to re-blog it I would be very grateful.
Dragons Rule OK. V.M.Sang (author) 